The lights are on every evening during the wintertime in Gatlinburg, and now every display is environmentally friendly. Whatever could Gatlinburg do to improve upon its annual four-month long citywide winter lights promotion, an endeavor which has grown in popularity every year since its inception in 1989? Why, start over, of course, with more than a million dollars worth of imagination and an eye on protecting our environment with the use of LED (light emitting diode) bulbs! With the 100 percent conversion of Gatlinburg Winter Magic tm from incandescent to LED, the City has launched the milestone transformation to a new era of winter-long visual entertainment in Gatlinburg, which attracts hundreds of thousands of visitors each year to its must-see collection of bright, colorful lights and favorite winter scenes through the month of February. Featuring one-of-a-kind LED lighting displays along Gatlinburg’s famous Downtown Parkway, adjacent River Road, and the triangle juncture of the two, the $1.6 million-plus rollout of custom designed and fabricated lighting displays are marked by sections reminiscent of winter forests, evergreens and romance. Gatlinburg has converted its entire winter lights program to quarter-watt LED bulbs, replacing the 5-watt incandescent bulbs and saving the City some 95 percent in energy cost and allowing the City to light the entire 120 days of the program for what it once cost for three days of electricity. The holiday lights once again take the spotlight when Gatlinburg’s 22nd annual celebration of Gatlinburg Winter Magic tm kicks off with its Chili Cookoff on Wednesday, November 7.